


True Love Hurts

by EarthsickWithoutYou



Series: What If [6]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Dark Will Graham, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Enemies to Lovers, M/M, Pining, Season 3, Smut, Touch-Starved Hannibal, Yearning, prison hannibal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-25
Updated: 2020-10-25
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:54:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27192716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EarthsickWithoutYou/pseuds/EarthsickWithoutYou
Summary: Hannibal is in the BSHCI and Will is supposedly happy in his marriage to Molly.  But a special letter from Hannibal causes Will to reach a breaking point in his yearning for the Chesapeake Ripper.
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Series: What If [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1866316
Comments: 24
Kudos: 224





	True Love Hurts

“Will?” Molly whispered gently in the darkness. The sheets rustled as she shifted forward to brush a curl back from Will’s forehead. 

He froze in the middle of his nightmare spasms, soaked in sweat, mumbling the same three syllables repeatedly, rhythmically, in time with his harsh breaths. It was a dark song he could not resist in slumber, as hard as he fought the siren call of it during his waking hours. Molly knew how he tried to repress his forbidden longings, how much he wanted to be not only a good man, but _her_ good man. Maybe that was the part that hurt the most for both of them, because the truth was, he could be neither of these things.

“What is it?” Will murmured, his voice bleary as a smear of blood-black paint, a stain on their marriage. Blood seeping from a wound left long ago by the one who still had his heart. There was nothing she could do but ride this out until the inevitable collapse.

“You said his name again.” She kept her voice a whisper of a sigh, wistful for what they couldn’t be for each other, broken by the way she still loved him, but she understood she did not know Will Graham completely, could never _see_ him.

Will woke up a bit more fully, slowly blinking and glancing down at his own bare torso, dotted with perspiration, feeling the strain in his muscles and the rapid beat in his heart to bring back the knowledge of where he had just been, deep in his head, terrified, elated and whole. Again, as he always did, he revived to consciousness to find himself in pieces. No matter how much he cared for Molly, and that was a lot, Will was sleeping alone, as if she wasn’t even there in any way that mattered; their connection was severed; it had never fully taken root.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered truthfully, brows knitted. 

He pressed his lips together, waiting for a wave of revulsion at his dreamscape that never came. All the dream left behind was the desire to fall back into it, away from reality where everything hurt and disappointed him. All he did was hurt and disappoint, but when he was asleep anything was possible, even a version of himself who acted freely and loved the most damaging person he’d ever met, to horrifying excess.

“I know you are, honey. Do you need to be alone again for a while?” she asked, briefly touching his face, thinking better of it, withdrawing her touch with a flicker of hurt and resignation. “Alone with your letter?”

“Yes,” Will admitted. “Molly, I…”

“It’s okay.” She shifted from her side to lie down on her back. “I mean, it’s not okay, but it _is._ I know you can’t help yourself. We’ll find a way through this. For tonight, just do what you need to.”

He kissed her forehead, a terribly difficult small gesture; everything inside him screamed for escape when he showed Molly husbandly affection. But she deserved his tenderness, while he still had some to spare, before the dream swallowed him alive one night, love, tenderness, hate, fear and all.

“Thank you,” he whispered. 

Then he slipped from the bed to pad shakily to the dresser. He opened the top drawer and took out the letter, immediately comforted by the familiar wrinkles in the envelope that had been handled so many times it was worn and the ink of the message was faded, though still legible. His heart should slow when he found comfort, but instead it skipped an eager beat of insuperable anticipation.

***

Will got a fire going in the living room, then settled into his armchair. He pulled a warm blue blanket from the top of the chair and wrapped it around his bare shoulders. Winston woke at the soft sound of his movements and sleepily wandered over, breaking off from the rest of the pack of former strays who were still dreaming on their pillows across the room. The dog nuzzled into Will’s plaid pajama pant-clad calf in concern and Will petted through his furry head with a murmured reassurance. 

“Everything’s okay, Winston, you can go back to sleep.” 

A comforting lie, but cold comfort to Will. His lies had long since lost the ability to keep him warm in the stubborn solitude of his soul’s endless winter.

Winston curled up on the rug in front of the fire and drifted back to sleep while Will envied his ability to do that. He knew that sleep would elude him for the rest of the night until dawn found him still foolishly here, trapped by his yearning as surely as if he was the one in a prison cell. 

_And maybe I am._

A tear slid down his cheek as his thumb adoringly stroked across the calligraphy-style writing on the front of the envelope. _“To Will Graham, on the occasion of his marriage.”_

The more recent letter, the one telling him not to go through the door Jack held open, had been easy to toss into the fire and watch burn. It had been a vile taunt, no less bright with passionate desire, but so spiteful and manipulative that although Will helplessly obeyed its unspoken invitation, he did not need to hold onto the physical fact of the message itself.

This older letter, from the week after he married Molly, after the wedding was announced in the society pages of the newspapers, was different. It held no viciousness. It teemed instead with dangerous vulnerability. 

“ _Dear Will,  
I was deeply touched to read of your recent marriage. Please accept this small gesture of my regard for you, and know that I think of you always._

_Sincerely,  
Hannibal Lecter”_

Enclosed with the letter was a pencil and charcoal sketch of Will, as he had looked on the day Hannibal was arrested. In the gorgeously rendered piece, Will was pictured sitting up in bed, a little bit woozy from his ordeal at Muskrat Farm. With painstaking attention to detail, Hannibal had captured the glistening brightness in his tearful eyes, the tense set of his jaw, the dark curls spilled messily on his head, his soft flannel shirt and the sprawl of his nervous legs under the blanket. This was how Will looked, waking up to find that Hannibal had saved him, carried him home, cleaned and tended to his wounds, bathed and dressed him, then tucked him into bed. An air of painful tenderness and despair seemed to waft from every stroke of the pencil and charcoal. Anyone could tell by looking at this portrait that the artist was desperately in love with his subject.

And maybe that made this a manipulation too; it was Hannibal saying, _you moved on and married someone else, but see how I love you as no one else ever can. Know that I have seen you through and through, and I love every part of you. More than that, I crave your presence like oxygen, and I’m still waiting. I’ll always be waiting._ It was meant to make Will regret marrying Molly, meant to reignite the flame between himself and Hannibal like detonating a bomb without caring who got hurt in the blowback. 

Hannibal succeeded in these goals so easily that Will ought to find the letter and drawing infuriating. Instead, he treasured them. He cherished them like he did the smiling stab wound on his stomach and the nasty scar on his forehead. Will had so few pieces of evidence that Hannibal could be weak for him, could be decimated to chaotic despair by his love for Will. How could Will help keeping his treasures close, stroking his scars when he masturbated but never letting Molly touch them or offer comfort for his past ordeals? How could he help himself when he was equally, incurably in love with his worst enemy, the man who ruined his life, ruined _Will_? 

It took definitively starting over to prove to Will he could do no such thing; he was running in circles only to collide with himself at every turn; there was no escape from Hannibal. There never had been, and he’d been worse than a fool to lie to himself it could ever be otherwise; he’d been cruel to drag Molly into this mess.

So he’d go on, like the proverbial “boat against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” He would spend his days trying to be good, prove he could be who Jack always hoped he was, who Molly needed. He’d help catch the Dragon, lose the excuse for seeing Hannibal once that was over, feel his heart break all over again every time he lied and pretended he merely hated his love. He didn’t know what it was going to do to him when he couldn’t see Hannibal anymore. He was afraid to find out. He only knew he could never let this letter go.

***

When the light of day streamed through the front windows on the rustic house where Will had tried to make a home, he yawned and stretched. Calm again, he went to the bedroom where Molly was still sleeping and placed the letter back in his drawer under the neatly rolled bundles of his socks and underwear. He showered, took the dogs outside, gave them breakfast and made some coffee for himself and Molly, plus a batch of pancakes that would delight Walter when he woke. It was Saturday, but there was no rest for the wicked. After forcing himself through what should be a calm, soothing domestic breakfast with his “family,” Will would go right for the BSHCI like a bird voluntarily flying back into its cage when it could be living a wonderful life in its proper habitat. Freedom was just another shackle; Hannibal’s presence, heavy like a wine-soaked sponge lifted to Will’s self-imposed crucifixion, was the only thing in this world that mattered.

***

“I’m not fortune’s fool,” Will announced apropos of nothing but his own all-consuming frustration, “I’m yours.”

At first, Hannibal’s only response was to ignore Will (only making it more obvious that Will’s words had surprised him into silence) and play himself off as distantly amused. The killer lifted his hand above him, casually examining his nails and the play of light between his fingers, as if Will’s voice wasn’t ringing through his ears, resonating through his skull, haunting every room in his memory palace.

“That’s it, huh, you’re just going to pretend you don’t care?” Will sulked, for the moment letting himself do so without caring that he was being so obvious it was practically _needy._ “Does it make you feel any better?”

“No,” Hannibal admitted, lowering his hand and turning to the glass partition between them to fully look at Will. His golden gaze took in Will’s searching cobalt eyes, and they sank into each other for a moment like teeth piercing skin deep enough to draw blood. “It doesn’t make me feel any better. But you have me at a rather stunning disadvantage, Will. Perhaps that’s right where you want me.”

“Perhaps that’s right where I need you,” Will admitted. He chewed his lower lip, aware of the camera feed allowing Alana to listen in on their conversation, but unable to stop himself from spiralling down this rabbit hole. “Maybe you knew that, and that’s why you’re here.”

“There are lots of reasons why I’m here, and every one of them has to do with you.” Hannibal stood primly with his broad shoulders spread, hands clasped behind his back. 

Were his hands nervously slick like Will’s? Did he dream of Will every night until he could barely function without seeing him, or had Will wildly blown the man’s regard out of proportion? What were they to each other, after all?

“I wish I could feel your heartbeat.” Will took a step closer and noticed a throb in Hannibal’s beautiful throat and a new moisture glistening in his warm but infinitely deadly brown eyes. “I just want to know the truth about you and me. For once I don’t want to play a game. I’m so tired, Hannibal.”

“I know that, Will.” Hannibal unclasped his hands, then pressed one to the glass barrier. “But really, by now, do you need to hear the words or feel my heart like the thud of a bullet against your palm? Don’t you already know how I feel?”

“I can’t believe you’re being this honest with me.” Will placed his hand on the glass, flush to Hannibal’s, imagining he could feel the warmth of the killer’s hand although it was merely a ghost sensation, a wish.

“I never wanted to be anything else.” Hannibal’s eyes bore into Will as if he would strip the flesh from his bones, and Will gulped, shifting his finger up and down slightly, simulating the motion of caressing Hannibal’s finger. 

Will wanted to run into the darkness; it was the light that tormented him, and Hannibal knew it -- had always known. He knew the inside of Will without looking, but he so badly wanted to _feel_ him, to possess, to the exclusion of anyone else with a supposed claim on Will. His hungry jealousy and merciless devotion were like a sweet form of drowning, deluging Will in a deep ocean of forbidden joy.

Hannibal’s eyes eagerly drank in the action of Will’s hand, the obvious implication of affection, even a calming gesture, centering. He was Will’s beast, and he leaned into Will’s touch as if he were a flower humbled by the sun. But they were darkness. They were every contradiction; one loving, longing look from Hannibal just like this, like _this_ , and Will was lost. Dark, poignant eyes spilling poems, digging into Will’s old wounds, scraping back flesh and sucking blood with a smothered sigh of relief. Possession and surrender. Beautiful, regal cheekbones, plush lips, that handsome face rendered even more striking with the punishingly short haircut. His hair was silver now, gorgeous, vulnerable yet refined, human yet not. Will’s Hannibal, his love, if only his _lover_ \-- Will could taste the two of them together in his mouth like tangy-sweet blood. It was a premonition, free from dread this time.

“What made you lie?” he asked on a bated breath. “Was it fear of how you felt, fear of my rejection, my loyalty to the status quo?”

“Fear of your fear of yourself,” Hannibal murmured, silk drenching every word. “My darling.”

Will’s breath caught as his heart staggered. “Your...yours?”

Hannibal traced the shimmering ghost of Will’s face over the glass and Will _almost_ felt his strong fingers canvassing his skin, his cheek, his stubbled jaw, then the mean red line across his brow with special attention. The killer deftly painted the touches on the glass with his fingers, weaving landscapes of broken dreams.

“If you want to be. It’s all I ever wanted for both of us. I would need it to be you, the real you, Will, and I would accept nothing less. I would allow you to accept nothing less than the full flourish of your Becoming. Knowing you are hiding, crushing your own beauty like flowers in your fist every day has been a matter of continual pain to me. I could not watch it up close with tolerance.”

Will knew it would happen any moment, Alana’s interruption. She wasn’t going to stand for this sort of thing, and would certainly report it to Jack. Will didn’t care; even his guilt over Molly was a distant, untouchable thing when he was this achingly close to Hannibal. 

“Why?” he whispered as they walked with matching timing, effortlessly synchronized, quiet footsteps to the area of the glass partition where several open circles let in the air. 

Alana trusted Will not to get too close; that’s why there wasn’t a guard behind him to stop him from what was about to happen. He slipped his fingers through one of the openings in the glass, knowing how easy it would be for Hannibal to break his hand or bite a finger off as a keepsake. It wouldn’t even surprise him, and it would be worth it to feel his touch (the pain always was).

Hannibal looked down at his hand, then back up into Will’s gaze, noticing next the blush in his cheeks. Then the lights snapped off and they were plunged into darkness. Alana had lost patience and done the first thing she could to end this problematic encounter. Next, a guard would come barging in, and then there would be a thorough scolding -- but not yet, not _yet._

“Because I love you,” Hannibal whispered, pressing a few fast, desperate kisses to Will’s fingers. 

The moist, sudden intimacy of his lips on Will’s sensitive skin made the profiler gasp, “I love you, too, Hannibal. I’ll come back for you.”

“I know,” Hannibal answered, right before the guard came in and Will stepped back. He could just make out a faint glimmer of the passion in Hannibal’s all-encompassing eyes and wondered why Alana thought that darkness could ever keep them apart.

***

Will made up a story for Jack and Alana, embellishing it with his usual disguises of dignified justice; a tale about his noble attempt to draw Hannibal closer and glean hidden truths of the Dragon’s identity and location which the Ripper might be hiding. A clever, convincing story of how he tried to play on Hannibal’s notorious fondness for him to get what they needed. Jack fell for the story because he still needed to believe Will was on his side, the right side. Alana allowed the story because she couldn’t do anything about Will’s true intentions -- she had no proof. But she did revoke Will’s visiting rights.

“For the time being,” she said, “I don’t trust the two of you in the same place. You say you’re only toying with his emotions, but I worry you may be toying with all of us, maybe without even fully realizing it.”

“That’s...incredibly condescending,” Will complained, keeping his tone loose and arch. 

“I’ve asked you to go to uncomfortable places to save lives,” Jack put in thoughtfully, looking very uncomfortable perched on Alana’s office couch while the others circled the room like boxers between matches. “But you don’t need to take it that far, Will. Getting close enough for Hannibal to touch is too close.”

“You know what, Jack?” Will said with a haunting smile. He paused with his hands in his pockets. 

He’d worn his nice, pressed trousers today, dressing more neatly than usual because he knew what Hannibal liked and found arousing; this aroused him in turn. Jack had a point and so did Alana: he did certain things unconsciously, he went too far. But he was somehow ready, after exchanging such startling confessions with Hannibal, he was ready to come out of hiding from himself. To do what he wanted with surface level clarity of his intent. To let Molly go because keeping her on the line for him was pointless and cruel; to let himself go because somehow Hannibal had convinced him at last that he deserved happiness. 

Alana paused in her own pacing around the room, hands on her hips in that smart striped pantsuit. She’d come into her own, ruby-lipped, strong-willed, a force to be reckoned with. It was time Will did the same, burst from the chrysalis and stood tall, certain and imposing. 

“You’re right,” Will chortled softly. “I got too close. I’ll keep my distance, cool down. I was so obsessed with catching the Dragon and putting an end to this, getting back to my real life that I went too far.”

“I’m glad to hear you say that,” Jack answered with visible, if not entirely convinced, relief. Will knew how he felt; he used to be even more invested in seeing the good in himself than Jack was.

But he still heard Hannibal’s delicious accent dripping over the words, “ _I love you,_ ” and had not forgotten his own promise. He had made dreadful mistakes in the past, committed to vows he’d never be able to keep, pushed away the one he really loved because he refused to love himself. That was over now; he would keep this promise, forever. He was a living personification of devotion to the only cause that mattered, a chapel built for Hannibal alone. 

“Yes,” Alana said, transparently disbelieving. Still, she’d laid down the law, and from her perspective it probably seemed likely enough Will would obey, because his only other choice was outright madness. She didn’t believe he would consciously choose that, but she couldn’t be more wrong. “Yes, I’m glad to hear it, too.”

***

Will didn’t go back home. On an odd impulse, before leaving that morning he had slipped the treasured envelope containing Hannibal's letter and drawing into his jacket pocket near his heart; there was nothing else left for him at home. He would dearly miss his dogs, but they would be loved and cared for always, and that was a comfort. 

He did send a letter to Molly, via email. It was a cold format for a goodbye, but he had always been cold to her, despite his best intentions, so cold it poisoned his sincere kindness. In ending things between them, he couldn’t truly offer of himself. All of him was with Hannibal; _that’s_ how over it was with Molly. But he tried to tell her with that same useless and shameful gentleness how it wasn’t her fault, he had to go away, ultimately it was for her own safety, he was becoming someone who couldn’t be her husband (in every way that mattered, he had never been her husband, but some else’s all along. She knew this, and there was no point adding it to his letter. Molly had already forgiven his heart’s unintended indiscretion, Hannibal’s brand on it, and Will hoped she would be tougher on her next partner, hold them to a standard she deserved. Molly deserved everything).

He got himself a motel room and split his time for a few days between reviewing the Dragon’s files and casing the BSHCI. When he was ready with an insane but workable plan, he broke into the hospital one night, using his skills from the right side of the law to disable the security system. As soon as the first guard confronted him, Will let go into himself, feeling the pendulum drop for the very last time in his mind. He snapped one guard’s neck, then shot another, finding nothing but peace in the quick, brutal acts. 

When he got to Hannibal’s cell, he was slightly breathless, blood-splattered, but focused. There was no wedding ring on his hand; it had been replaced by a gun with a silencer, now missing a bullet.

“My beautiful Will,” Hannibal smiled, his whole face lighting up at the sight of a murderous, rampaging version of his beloved. “Have you come to rescue me?”

“You knew I would,” Will smirked. He shot the control panel beside Hannibal’s cell and the lock mechanism fell open with a pathetic click. 

Hannibal stepped out of his cell and clasped Will’s face the way he had during the feverish throes of encephalitis and the gruesome afterbirth of Will’s near-murder of Clark Ingram. He held Will as if no one could ever be so unbelievably lovely and seductive and he was entranced, despite all of his careful efforts to maintain an almost mechanically elegant immunity to love. Hannibal kept falling in deeper, drowning in Will’s eyes, the closer he got, and they were too close now to be parted in this mortal realm, or thereafter.

“I _hoped_ you would come,” Hannibal said almost wistfully.

“Well,” Will smiled, “Now you know.”

***

Will had brought extra clothes for himself and Hannibal, and arrived in a car he had rented under an alias; it was easy for them to slink into the shadows of the night, where they belonged. At a nowhere motel, Will dropped his duffel bag on the floor of their plain little room for the night. 

Hannibal stood looking at him as if the sight of Will was as shockingly sweet as his first breaths of free air when he stepped outside the prison walls. 

Will smiled and peeled himself out of the clean denim jacket he’d thrown on after changing out of his bloody attire back at the BSHCI. He threw the jacket onto a chair by the window and drew the dingy curtains shut with a long sigh. After everything, finally they were here. It had been hours on the road, switching off with Hannibal so they could drive far enough to be hard to find, and he stretched his arms, thinking he should be fucking _exhausted,_ but the adrenaline of the whole affair still had him wired, intensely so.

Hannibal was still watching him like a mirage. “You left plentiful evidence behind at the hospital.”

“I want them to know it was me. They can watch the tape back and see me. We’ll be out of the country tomorrow, and they’ll never catch up with us. I’ve chartered us a private plane and a pilot who’s far too well-paid to breathe a word to anyone about you and me, or where we go.”

“You’ve blossomed with furious, magnificent power, my dear,” said Hannibal huskily. 

He looked adorable in a sweatshirt and sweatpants Will had brought him, the clothes so un-Hannibal Lecter he almost blended into his surroundings when they checked into the motel.

“Do you remember what I said to you the last time we met?” Will came closer, moth to flame, and let their fingers by their sides brush together, then lace, puzzle pieces slotting into place.

“As surely as if you etched the words into my heart. I could never forget it. I could never forget, nor regret, being with you tonight, even if tomorrow we’re locked in separate cells.”

“That’s not showing a whole lot of faith in my planning skills,” Will said wryly. He guided Hannibal’s hands to sit on his hips. When Hannibal tried to hold on gently, Will pressed his fingers tighter until the killer had him in a fierce clutch.

It had been so long since Hannibal had touched anyone that he squeezed his eyes shut and winced, releasing a sharp exhale. 

“I’m sorry, is this too much?” Will asked, and his gentleness was the sort he could never offer to Molly; it was pure, absent of guilt or agenda; it was love, the ability to accept whatever Hannibal wanted or needed in this moment, the desire to do anything to make his beloved comfortable and at ease.

“Yes,” Hannibal chuckled softly, nuzzling his nose against Will’s, then pressing their foreheads together. “In every wonderful way, Will, it is far too much.” 

He kept his hands where they were and squeezed tighter, moved a few inches closer as well. His breath was minty from the little travel tube of toothpaste Will had brought; his skin fragrant with the generic soap, but mixed with his natural body heat it couldn’t have smelled more amazing and beguiling to Will.

“How do you feel?” Will asked in concern, finally letting in his worry about Hannibal’s emotional stability given the years of confinement, the isolation, and the humiliation of living in such a state.

“Light-headed.” Hannibal lifted the bottom of Will’s henley to dance his fingertips over Will’s bare waist and back, causing Will to sigh hotly. 

“Happy,” Hannibal smiled, “So happy. I do have faith. I believe we’ll fly away together into a new life, twist the whole world to our design. I only wanted you to know that no matter what occurs, we’ll never be separated again.”

“We were never separate,” Will mused, shifting even closer so that their groins were nearly touching; their chests brushed together with tantalizing heat; he was dizzy already with their suggestive proximity and the feeling of the strong, smooth, knowing fingertips on his skin. 

“No one is stronger than you and me as one," he added. "I found the Dragon before I came back to you; he’s dead, gift-wrapped for Jack. Even once he knows else what I’ve done, and maybe he does by now, Jack will feel a sort of reluctant gratitude. If he hadn’t pulled me back into the field, Dolarhyde might have gone on and on, who knows for how long? Now we don’t have to know.”

“I’m so proud of you, Will,” Hannibal sighed, an unmanageable desire burning in his eyes. Yet he kissed Will’s cheek, chaste as a Victorian suitor while their chaperones’ backs were turned. “You’re…” He lowered his eyes shyly, overwhelmed. “My dream. My only dream.”

Hannibal’s voice was beautiful like this, throaty and deep, the words going right to Will’s libido as they ignited in his heart and his whole body went raw with aching love. 

“You’ve been in my dreams every single night,” Will said, his breath tickling Hannibal’s face when he drew close enough to kiss, just another whisper away. 

Hannibal lifted his gaze as a startled smile made him even more gorgeous. “I’m struggling to believe this is really happening, Will.”

“Does this feel real?” Will cupped his face and kissed him deeply, although he had meant to begin with softer presses of lips. 

Once their lips met, it felt too good to stop, and neither one of them could have summoned the ability to be subtle, tentative or teasing about this. He knew the physical passion had to be scorching Hannibal inside with an oversensitive reaction, but his beloved made no attempt to slow down, only dragged him closer, got a hand deep in his curls and kissed harder.

He devoured Hannibal’s lips with feverishly wet kisses; he licked into his beloved’s sweetly lethal mouth and savored the ardent reciprocation, the warm tongue sliding alongside his own, the cut of Hannibal’s sharp fangs, drawing luscious pain as he pierced the delicate pink flesh of Will’s lips. Their love was too deep for surface level; they had to go further, past the boundaries of pain and pleasure until they were one and the same: pain/pleasure/Hannibal/Will, impossible to piece apart which was which. They needed more.

Tumbling to the bed, they writhed together and tore the clothing from each others’ bodies with satisfied growls. Will grinned at the sight of Hannibal beneath him, naked with his beautiful strong body, the softly wiry grey hair on his chest and stomach. He stared wantonly at Hannibal’s cock, so heavy and hard, already dripping, all because of Will’s kisses and the way they tasted and groped each other, starving for it. 

His own body vibrated headily with the same need; he throbbed for Hannibal, and when his lover flipped them and slinked down Will’s body to take Will’s cock deep into the tight heat of his mouth, Will let out a wounded, delighted sob. Such pleasure was too acute, but he was caught in Hannibal’s grip, to be wrung of every ounce of bliss his body could produce until Hannibal was satisfied. Then it wouldn’t be long until it all began again, as there was nothing between them but hunger now.

Hannibal deep-throated him and held Will’s hips harshly to the bed so that there was no escape from the dominating force of the pleasure. Will bucked up into Hannibal’s wet warmth, spilling plentifully all over the older man’s tongue when his cock slid back from the hot clutch of his throat. Hannibal let out an animal gasp of pure euphoria and swallowed Will’s cum, then licked his lips and rasped, “You taste even better than I imagined.”

Will moaned, shaky fingers raking through Hannibal’s short hair, his body trembling with the aftershocks of his fierce orgasm. “Fuck me, fuck me, please.”

Hannibal moaned in return, undone by the sound of Will begging to be taken over by him, by the way Will shuddered and reached for him and how clear it was that he was all Will needed. He tasted more of Will, eating him out with lingering, sloppy obsession, and the sound of Will’s broken cries drove him wilder.

He opened Will slowly but firmly, with great passion, living for every deeper slide of his confident fingers helping Will relax, locating the center of his pleasure and pressing right _there_ , just so, making Will mewl in desperation as his cock grew hard again.

“I think you’re ready for me now, my darling,” Hannibal marveled, amazed at Will’s complete openness to this new form of seduction, desperately in love with the way his smallest touch made Will quiver and his most intimate, intense touches hit Will so strongly that the younger man could barely stand it. He bore it so bravely. Hannibal glowed with pride and adoration as he hovered above his beautiful boy and slicked his rock hard erection back and forth over his more relaxed but still very tight entrance.

Will stared at him, sweaty and red-faced, weeping with need. “Please.”

“Lovely boy,” he praised, flicking open the bottle of lube Will had brought, adding even more moisture to the already sticky and plentiful combination of lube and saliva dripping on Will’s virginal hole. “My boy.”

“Always,” Will smiled, his hands smoothing from Hannibal’s firm ass up his strong back, circling with tender solicitude the terrible mark of the Verger brand on that lovely skin, a precious body that should be altered by no scar which Will did not bestow. Yet he knew that the scars he had left inside Hannibal were far deeper, perhaps even uglier. He was proud of them and wanted to offer comfort for their residual throbbing pain at the same time. Those scars were his, as Hannibal was.

He held onto Hannibal’s powerful biceps and nodded up at him as Hannibal stroked himself, then pressed to Will’s entrance, both of them now completely prepared after years of wanting nothing more than this, an act that was all at once so simple, but beyond any other they could perform to show their love. He would never take it for granted again, his ability to have Hannibal close and his, to give in and be covered in such perfect affection. “Always, Hannibal.”

Hannibal entered him with a deep groan of pleasure, a few inches of his hot, hard cock pressing into Will’s slick, tight perfection until he paused to let Will get used to the sensation. 

“Oh, Will,” he gasped, rubbing his fingers over Will’s pretty nipples, rocking his hips to delve a little deeper, halfway now. 

“Oh my God,” Will moaned, drunk on pleasure and the scent of Hannibal, the delightful heat of him and the ferocious but endlessly adoring way he fucked him, as someone so indescribably wanted, the way Will had treasured his memories of Hannibal and that letter -- that drawing -- the feeling of _them,_ like nothing else he had ever known: otherworldly and consuming.

He grabbed Hannibal’s ass and urged him deeper until the older man pressed all the way in to the hilt, once again nudging Will’s prostate, the sensitive gland keening with yet more exquisite sensation. Hannibal felt so huge inside him, and this was messy, dirty, naughty, divine. Will wrapped his arms and legs around his lover and kissed his mouth hard, driving his hips up insistently to meet Hannibal’s every thrust while his movements went from tentative to fiercer, faster. Their skin slapped together with juicy, profane noise and they kissed with fiendish heat while Hannibal kept fucking him until they were both teetering over the edge of paradise. The motel was next to a train track, and the walls rattled slightly as the occasional train hurtled past; the cheap bed frame shook, meanwhile, with the force of their love in motion. 

As for prolonging this, trying out every position in the book, taking turns tying each other up, spanking and edging, all of Will’s darkest, sweetest fantasies brought to vivid living color and variations of pleasure beyond his imagination, they would have time for all of that in their new life.

For tonight, this was more than enough, more than everything, a bounty above the price of every extravagant luxury Will could conceive; the natural, rapturous beauty of the way they moved together, sweaty, hot and needy, Hannibal disintegrating so quickly because he hadn’t been touched in years and had craved Will for years before that. For Will to want him had been enough for Hannibal to live off for years more in isolation; for Will to actually touch and kiss him had been almost enough to make him come with no further provocation. For the two of them to make love…

“I must be dreaming,” Hannibal gasped, their tears mingling as he fucked deep into Will and reveled in the sensation of Will clinging to him with devastating commitment. His skin tingled with excruciating joy at being held, caressed and needed by the one he loved; it was too much to also feel his engorged cock slamming into Will’s perfect, beautiful body and for Will’s cries of abandon to fill the air. Too much -- the intensity ratcheted inside him to an intolerably powerful orgasm and he came into Will with a weak, lost cry, sobbing Will’s name as his hips spasmed hard against him.

“I must be dreaming,” he repeated in a daze, and Will brought him back with soothing hands and words, framing Hannibal’s tear-drenched face and tracing his cheekbones.

“I’m here,” Will sighed, shaking uncontrollably from the new feelings that had racked his body with strange, hot pleasure, “I love you, Hannibal. I’ll hold you all night and then we’ll go away together, anywhere we want. It’s real.”

Still trembling and fighting back sobs, nonetheless Hannibal climbed back down the bed and sucked Will off again, elated by Will’s high-pitched whimpers of oversensitive ecstasy. To take his incomparably gorgeous boy into his mouth or to claim his body hard and rough was the greatest honor Hannibal could fathom, and he would honor Will’s surrender every single time it was offered, until Will was so sated with bliss he couldn’t even move.

So it was now, as Will rested safe in Hannibal’s arms, automatically still shaking and moaning, but unable to form a single word or move an inch, not that he had any need or desire to change a thing about this moment. 

Hannibal kissed Will’s forehead scar while dragging a lazy finger across his belly scar; he could not even breathe, it seemed, without possessing Will in some way. They drifted off to sleep without even realizing they let go of consciousness, and this time their dreams weren’t that much different from their waking experience. They were locked together, kissing each other senseless and dizzy, naked and covered in blood, perhaps a lovely vision of the future. 

Perhaps Will would tell him someday, about the way he used to take that letter and drawing out and stare at them all alone at night, caressing the paper and lingering like a man at prayer. Yet he thought, as his dreams slowly waned to waking again in the morning, he thought Hannibal might already know, somehow, how much the words and the picture had meant, how they brought the two of them back together against all odds.

Their escape the next day was a brisk, fluid thing, easily falling into the lines of Will’s careful planning. An extended honeymoon period followed, replete with long steamy nights in each other’s arms and the occasional dalliance in murder, dropping their crimes like rose petals along the path of their travels. 

During that first year they spent wrapped up in each other with sultry, hedonistic indulgence, their enemies scrambled around trying to secure new beginnings of their own, as if there was anywhere they could go or anything they could do to be safe from Hannibal and Will once they deemed it time for revenge. Of course there was no escape, and the vengeance, when it arrived, was wildly cruel, decadently splendid, Hannibal and Will all over.

**Author's Note:**

> I was thinking about the "fortune's fool" scene again ( _as one does_ ) and wishing one of them called the other on their bullshit, and coincidentally soon after was listening to Kesha's "The Harold Song" and here you go. Hope you enjoyed and thanks for reading!


End file.
